The Boat (25 page)

Carl swallowed, unsure of how to proceed. “I’m just trying to help,” he finally said.

“Excellent. You’ll go first, then.” He stood, turned and began to pace. Carl gaped at him, feeling stupidly punch-drunk. “Okay, so let me get back to it. The problem. The problem as I see it…well, ha ha! The problem is that I
can’t
see it! You understand?” He was cycling up again, this time giddy, his voice almost breathy, almost shrieky. “And it all went so fast. Before I knew it, it was pretty much over. That’s when I thought of you people on the other boats. I was just trying to lure a couple of you over here, but you brought so many! Fun! It’s so much fun!” Spittle was flying from between his lips at every word and he was standing on tiptoe like an overexcited three year old. Then his heels crashed back to the deck.

He turned toward them and was completely calm.

Maggie felt her head spinning. She couldn’t keep up with this madman’s crazy train of thought.

“So I made this…” John turned and fished in the small deck box against the back wall of the bridge. Maggie heard the clinking even as he turned back, a long length of heavy chain in his hands. There was a handcuff at each end. “And what I’m going to do is chain you down there, where I can see, and then we’ll wait. Not long, I’m sure, as you can imagine.” He knelt in front of Carl, face lit with excitement. “You’ll be able to
fight
…really fight, you see?” He held the chain up. “And I’ll get to see it all!”

Carl felt his stomach trying to drop out of his body as fear coursed through him. He had to get through to this guy, he had to…he opened his mouth but before he knew what was happening, John had reached forward and snapped the cuff and chain around his neck. Carl pulled back sharply but only managed to bang his head on the rail, hard enough to see brief fireworks. The pain was immense.

“Oops…be careful!” John said and then reached around Carl again. He cut the line at Carl’s hands and then sprung up and away. He produced the gun in the same movement.

Maggie was sickened by his speed and agility.

Now John shook the chain that tethered Carl. “Up and at ‘em.” He shook the chain again.

Carl rolled to his hands and knees, dazed by fear and the knock to his head. His eyes rolled to Maggie’s and, in his distraught gaze, she saw his doom. She surged forward, forgetting her tied hands.

“Carl!” she said, panicking. She heaved against her bonds again and glared up at John Smith. “Leave him alone! You’re a monster! Let him go, you bastard! You animal!”

John’s eyes on her were heavy-lidded with an almost sleepy looking excitement. Steve recognized the look, even if Maggie was too distraught to. It was a look of lust.

“Oh, yeah, nice. Good; that’s very good. You’re next,” John said to Maggie and then yanked Carl’s chain. “Hurry up or I’ll just shoot you and move on to her. She’s very…exciting…to watch.” His eyes slid over Maggie again and she pushed back as though his gaze were a physical touch, redolent with lascivious intent.

Carl stood and John motioned him forward with the gun. Carl’s eyes rolled back to Maggie again and she began to cry at the dazed fear she saw in the big man’s features. Steve tried to push himself closer to her as John disappeared through the doorway behind Carl.

As soon as John disappeared through the doorway, Steve began working his hands back and forth against each other, trying to loosen the rope. “Can you turn around? Let me know when you can see them below.”

Maggie nodded, her eyes huge. “I’m scared.”

“Me too. Watch down there.” He was sweating and the heat in his wrists was tremendous. He could feel the skin blistering, beginning to abrade. He redoubled his efforts. He was almost past the widest part of his hands. Just a few millimeters of lost skin and a little blood for grease should get me free, he thought.

“He has…John Smith has a scratch on his neck. I saw it earlier. It looked infected, do you know what I mean?”

“Is he changing?”

“Maybe. He looked very pale and his eyes were…I see them,” Maggie said, her voice a quiet breath. “But his back is to us. You’re okay.” She glanced at Steve’s furiously working hands. “He’s attached the other handcuff to the rail. Oh god, Carl is on his knees, he can’t seem to…okay, he’s up, he’s up. Freeze.”

Steve froze, keeping his gaze directed at the outside back wall of the bridge, trying to concentrate and keep his heart from speeding him straight into a panic. Maggie’s voice came again, a bare whisper in the dark. “Okay…he’s out of my sight. He’s either headed back up or he stayed somewhere down there to…to…watch. Carl is…he’s looking around, is he looking for a weapon? I think so.”

Steve worked his hands back and forth, back and forth, the rope stretching minutely each time, his skin snagging between the rolling lines and tearing open.

“He’s testing the strength of the chain, pulling it, but he’s trying to do it quietly. He’s keeping his back to the rail, but he’s looking around again–that’s right, Carl, find something to use as a wea–he sees something, oh god, he sees something, Steve we have to help him. I think there’s…something is standing at the other side.” Maggie’s voice dropped below a whisper. Steve felt as though he was hearing her like thoughts in his own mind. He worked his hands. “Be very still, Carl, don’t move, don’t let it see you. I think it’s…it looks like its moving away…oh god, Carl!” Her last word was an abrupt scream and Steve paused, tensing up. Then he heard a bellow from the deck below–Carl. “God, no! No! Fight it, Carl, fight it!” The railing vibrated as Maggie threw herself against it, screaming. In her terror, she didn’t feel it as the railing split the side of her face, opening a gash on her cheekbone. She drummed her feet and kicked involuntarily. “Carl! Carl! Please, god, please, god! Help him, Steve, we have to help him, please god, oh god, it’s eating him! It’s eating him! Oh my jesus, oh my god, no, no, no…” Her screams wound down, dissolving into gulping sobs and now Steve could hear the wet, tearing sounds below. His stomach clenched.

Then his hand popped free of the rope.

He stared at it in stunned amazement as though he couldn’t believe it was free; as if it hadn’t seemed really possible. His hand was covered in blood and the skin at his wrist and the base of his thumb was nearly eaten away, but his hands were free. He turned to Maggie and began to untie her bonds.

She leaned forward over her knees, sobbing.

“Maggie,” he said, his voice quiet. “Maggie, we’re free…it’s okay, it’s okay, Maggie. Please be quiet. Please, Maggie. It’ll be okay.” He found that his fingers didn’t want to work; they were nearly frozen with pain and incipient panic. A sob found its way into his voice as he fumbled at her hands. “Please, Maggie, please listen for John.”

She quieted, her breath hitching. “Okay…okay, I’m listening.”

Steve nodded and glanced at the deck below. Carl lay against the rail, his body shaking as a sinker feasted at his chest. The deck was awash in blood that looked like oil in the moonlight and as Steve watched, two more sinkers shuffled into his sightline, intent on the fresh meal so close by. Steve felt his gorge rise in a bitter lump and he tore his eyes away.

Maggie’s hands were free.

He stood, grabbing her elbow and pulling her up with him. They both staggered against the rail and then righted themselves. Steve hugged Maggie to him, briefly. “Okay, it’s okay we’re going to–”

“What did you think?”

Steve felt Maggie stiffen against him as John’s voice came from the dark doorway leading to the bridge. John slid out into the moonlight, grinning his dead shark grin. “Of course, it was very exciting up here, too. The way you fought against the ropes! And when you bashed your face! That part was great; really, really great.”

“You’re a…a monster. An animal,” Maggie said, her voice tired, worn out from screaming. “Hasn’t there been enough? Haven’t enough people died?”

An honest confusion suffused John’s features. “Is that what you think? That I’m trying to kill people? Why the heck would I do that?”

“What do you call that?” Maggie’s voice was rising and she gestured to the deck below. “You
killed
Carl. You caused him to
die
. Don’t you
get
that?” Steve gripped her around the waist, afraid she was on the verge of launching herself at John.

John shook his head. “He’ll be back up in no time. Look there; he’s already starting.”

Shaking, Maggie turned her head. The sinkers had left Carl’s body. They did that as soon as someone began the change in earnest. Sinkers didn’t eat sinkers.

Carl’s fingers were twitching. Then his legs spasmed and his arms. He looked like a big dog caught in a bad dream. His head rolled side to side, causing a chunk of his neck to slide off where the sinker had been chewing on it. Behind it was coagulated black. Carl’s blood–what was left of it–had become as thick and sticky as jam.

His eyes opened and Maggie couldn’t see them very well from this height, but she knew they were milky, cataract covered. She’d seen it enough times to know. She sobbed and turned her face into Steve’s chest.

John stepped closer. “See there? Told you so. Feel better?”

Steve kept a wary eye on John, on the gun in John’s hand. He decided to take a different tack. “She feels better, yeah.” He felt Maggie stiffen in his arms and he squeezed her once, quickly.

“Good. Then we can move along,” John said, his tone brisk. “I only had the one chain, unfortunately, but I feel like I didn’t really need it, to be honest, because–”

“Because you still didn’t get to see, right? Not as much as you wanted to?” Steve’s voice is calm, conversational. He squeezes Maggie again.

“Yes, that’s just exactly right. I was distracted. Distracted by you two up here and also, well, I have to keep a watch out, don’t I? I don’t want one of them to get me. I don’t want to be one of the walking dead. Not now that I’ve found more alive people.”

Steve is nodding, his lips pursed consideringly as though he is trying to figure out a tough but ultimately solvable problem. “Yes, I see what you’re saying. You need a safe place to watch from, but you also need to be able to see the whole…the whole struggle.”

John’s gaze is wary and flat. He’s gone from shark to Gila monster. “Yes, that’s exactly right. The struggle is…it’s the good part. It’s very exciting. To me, it is.”

Steve nods again and squeezes Maggie one more time, a warning to be ready. “There’s something more though, isn’t there? More exciting to watch? Something else you want to see?” He felt Maggie buck slightly against him, but not as much as she might have if he hadn’t been preparing her.

John Smith licked his lips and his eyes lit with cautious fire. He looked at the split on Maggie’s face, the blood, the bruise already appearing. “Yes, there is something else. Something better.” His voice was low and his eyes were heavy again, almost drugged looking.

Steve’s voice dropped, too, becoming raspy. “You want me to hit her.” He didn’t ask this time, he knew; oh, yes, he knew. “Hit her and then fuck her. You want that…you want to
see
that.”

John nodded again and Steve noted with satisfaction that the gun in John’s hand had drooped to the side. He kept the excitement and nervousness out of his own voice. “I’ll fuck her up and then I’ll fuck her out. Good?”

John came another step closer and then faltered. He saw Steve’s eyes go to his gun. He brought it up sharply, aiming directly at Maggie. “Yeah. That’s what you’re going to do. Fuck her up and then fuck her out and then she’s taking a trip down one deck. To meet some of the other residents.”

Steve looked into Maggie’s eyes. He still held her around the waist but now his hands went to her arms and he pushed her back a pace. He whispered, “I’m sorry,” and brought his hand back. He slapped her across the face, rocking her head back. He heard John gasp behind them, almost a pant.

He brought his arm back again and slapped her backhand this time, sending her head the opposite direction, splitting her lip. She cried out and there was an answering squeal from John.

Steve gripped her, danced her backward to the side railing. He pushed her against it, bending her slightly. He kissed her roughly and grabbed her breast through her t-shirt, bending her further back. “Scream,” he whispered in her ear.

She screamed and the scream was petrified and furious; it tore at his heart. He twisted her breast and put his mouth over hers and she screamed again and it was muffled by his mouth and behind him, John was panting in earnest now.

Steve fumbled at the snap on her jeans and pushed them down past her ass.

In one swift movement, Steve knelt, his face level with Maggie’s crotch and he heard John’s hissing “yes!” behind him. He pulled her pants the rest of the way down, dragged them off. She screamed and now the scream was edged with tears. Her shaking hands beat lightly around his head like terrified birds. Her underwear were white cotton dotted with tiny, faded roses. They were torn at the seam on her waist, just under her belly button. He kissed the ragged tear, lightly and with tenderness, feeling both the cotton and her warm skin under his lips. He grabbed her ankles, closed his eyes, prayed.

Then he stood, bringing her ankles up, and tumbled her over the rail and out into darkness. He pushed her outward at the same time with the hope that she wouldn’t hit another deck on her way to the water.

Falling the forty feet to the water below, Maggie had time to hear John’s outraged howl and then, right before she hit the water, a gunshot.

Then she was under.

She struggled, churning in the water, disoriented and panicked and expecting a sinker to grab her arms or legs at any moment. Then her body, full of good oxygen, unhindered by heavy denim, righted itself and she kicked hard, propelling herself up. She broke through and the night air was warm, the stars a million, the moon gentle. She turned in a frantic circle. Everything was quiet.

“Steve!” She looked up, expecting to see him diving after her, but there was no one at the railing. Not even John Smith. “Steve!” Her scream bounced off the uncaring hull of
Flyboy
and rang back to her ears as though the big boat was mocking her grief. She turned in another circle, hoping that he would pop up somewhere nearby. He didn’t. She screamed until she felt as though her throat was alight with fire and she sank as all the air left her lungs. Seawater filled her nose and mouth and she struggled up again, blowing the water from her lungs, choking, and still she screamed.